


Battle Scars- Prompt 1

by Name1



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Pining, Pre-Relationship, Slow Burn, friends to something more, idiots to lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:06:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23586598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Name1/pseuds/Name1
Summary: “Scars tell a story, Din. There's nothing to be ashamed of. Every scar you have is a time you survived and I’m glad you have each and every one of them. They don’t look bad at all.”“You don’t have to lie on my account. I know what they look like.” Din doesn’t sound convinced, but he’s appreciative of her words, nonetheless. No one else has really seen him like this.She huffs at him. “You must think I’m a special brand of hideous, then. I have a lot more scars than you do."“Come on, Cara, be serious. You know you’re beautiful. No number of scars could ever change that.”
Relationships: Cara Dune & The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV), Cara Dune/The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 97
Collections: The Mandalorian Ficathon — April 2020





	Battle Scars- Prompt 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey there.  
> I had an hour today and this is how I spent it :)  
> Time for another prompt from the Ficathon on tumblr.  
> Next time, definitely NEXT TIME, I will stay under 2k I promise.

Din had been favoring his side all day. Cara wasn’t an idiot; he might not have been stabbed during that fight, but he must have gotten cut if the reddish stain seeping through his clothes was any indicator.

At first, she thought he was playing a game of chicken, to see who would mention it first but that wasn’t the case. He wasn’t hiding it all, he was just sulking in the corner like an injured animal licking his wounds. After their course was laid in, she watched as he gathered the med kit and gingerly eased himself into a chair. The kid was calmly watching him from the ground, but he grew distressed when he watched Din take out the cauterizing gun from its case to change out the fine conductive tip for one with a wider base. Din knew the kid’s intention before he tried climbing up his leg.

“No, No, Kid. It’s all right. Don’t wear yourself out. It’s not that bad.” He remembered the very earliest of days when the kid he saved had reached up to him to heal him in the desert, before Din had even known what he was capable of. He recalls putting him back in his floating carrier and the kid escaping several times until he locked the panels. _He was a determined little guy, that’s for sure._

The worried look on the kid’s face and the pitiful height of his ears we enough for Cara to finally speak up.

“We don’t hide injuries from each other, you idiot,” she says, as she walks over to the chair Din has pulled away from the table to sit in.

“I wasn’t hiding it,” he argues. He means to confidently stand his ground, but instead it comes across as sullen, like a petulant scolded child.

They had traveled together long enough that the air in the main hold of the Crest was thick with _something_ between them; something they didn’t have a name for but could practically taste hanging in the air. It tasted sweet, like the clean smell of shampoo after one of them showered; musky, like the smell of sweat; hot and spicy, like adrenaline spilling over after a fight; electric, like lightening during a summer storm with how it crackled in the air. Neither one of them put a name to this _thing_ , but that didn’t mean they could avoid it forever. It was starting to color their interactions more and more as the days passed by.

At first it was only a look; a look that was a little more longing than could be easily written off as a glance between friends; sometimes it was a stare than that lingered a moment too long. Then came their touches…. a brief touch of fingertips or the intentional brush of an arm. When they sat near one another, their legs would touch and every inch of her from knee to hip was hyperaware of his proximity. Wanting to touch him was starting to affect her ability to concentrate.

And their words…… Din never had a chance of keeping up with her, but he felt as though she was leaving herself open on purpose lately so he could tease her. They had progressed from merely teasing banter to what anyone with two brain cells to rub together would clearly call flirting. It was awkward, and endearing, and so sincere that it surprised her with its sweetness. Sometimes they would tease each other higher and higher, trading poorly masked innuendo until one of them backed down, leaving both of them _frustrated_ and on edge.

The kid tugged on her boot and it reminded her about the situation at hand. It had been a long day and Cara wasn't in the mood to negotiate.

“Come on strip,” she told him in a voice that didn’t leave much room for argument.

“What?” He knew she could be forward, but he must have misheard her.

“You heard me. Strip. Let's see it,” she repeats again, her hands coming up in the universal sign of impatience.

He just sits there, the perfect image of calm. At least the helmet is good for something; it hid the incredulous look on his face he’s sure must look pretty ridiculous right now

She takes his hesitation for offense. “Come, on. Don't look at me like that, you know I don't mean your helmet. Take off your _shirt_....”

He finally concedes and shifts his weight in the chair to lean forward.

“Pants too, if you really want.....” she says suggestively, the brilliant grin on her lips instantly making him forget what they were talking about. He knows the list of things he wouldn’t do for that smile is growing shorter every day.

The easy banter they always shared was growing more and more suggestive as the days passed. He wasn't sure how much of what she said was just Cara being a little shit and how much was a real invitation. He would call her bluff one day, but not right now…......maybe tomorrow…….. or the day after that. 

“You need help, Din?” she asks, actual concern starting to seep into her flirty tone.

“No, that’s okay,” he groans, “I can manage it.”

She huffs out a laugh as she watched him struggle to get his shoulders of the backrest. “You are the most stubborn person I have ever seen.” 

“That can't be true,” he says back to her as he manages to sit upright. “You look in the mirror when you brush your teeth, I've seen you.”

The concern she couldn’t completely hide faded away as his words hit home. “Oh, ho…” she laughed. “You've got jokes now Din?”

“Did I distract you enough for you to let it go? I can cauterize it myself, you know.”

“Nope, not a chance,” she replies simply, an unimpressed look on her face. “Come on, take it off before I take it off.”

The pain or blood loss or maybe even her proximity or her words were bolstering him. He wanted to see what she would do.

“Knock yourself out,” he challenges her, as his arms fall to his sides.

“Good luck figuring out how to demagneti----" he trailed of awkwardly, as she had already pressed the right sequence of buttons on his vambrace to release the hold on the plates adorning his chest.

She raises one eyebrow at him and says, “You can tell me how impressive I am after I'm done.”

“Don't hold your breath.” _He was such a liar._ He _was_ impressed with her, on so many fronts. She watched him closely enough to figure out his controls and cared enough to recognize how he held himself when he was trying to downplay an injury. _She really was amazing._

Cara snickered as she went about removing shoulder guards and the largest plates of beskar before getting to his cloth layers. The flak jacket came of first. She helped him work his arm out and lifted it over his head followed by the quilted shirt, until he was armored on the bottom but wearing just a soft cotton shirt on top. 

“Are you sure this is okay?” she asks, before she uncovers his chest. This would be the most skin she had ever seen. “I know your helmet can't come off but what about this.” She tugs at the bottom of the shirt in question, asking for his approval.

“You can see my chest,” he tells her, “unless you're worried you might swoon……. I'm not sure I could catch you right now.”

She makes to punch him in his good shoulder but pulls her punch at the last second. “I’ll look past that one on account your injured.”

“You’re so kind.”

She gives him the most beautiful ‘eat-shit’ look he’s ever seen as she turns to the table to get everything set up.

“Okay, here we go, come on.” She pauses once she has the supplies ready to look down at the kid watching her intently. “He's going to be okay kid, don't worry.”

She produces a hypo from the med kit and injects it into the thickest part of his deltoid. 

Once the edge is off and his pain is dulled, she removes his shirt making sure to stretch the neckline around the helmet.

He lets out a hiss as his arm raises to allow the shirt to come off. “How much pain are you still in?” she checks in on him before she gets to the actual painful part.

“Not much, it’s fine.”

She finally gets a look at his wound and narrows her eyes at him reproachfully. It’s a deep laceration, over four inches long, wrapping around his ribcage under his arm and ending an inch away from his nipple. At least the edges were clean. ‘ _Shit,’ she thought. She knew how much cuts on the ribs could hurt. You move your chest muscles for everything, even breathing._

She says with a sigh, “this can't just be cauterized, a wound this big needs to be stitched closed. Let me wash my hands and I'll patch you up.” 

“How good are you at it?” he asks, figuring she had done it before.

“Good enough,” she says amicably. “Better than _you_ would be stitching under your own armpit with one hand, that's for sure.”

To keep the skin stretched so she doesn’t stitch it restrictively tight, she rests his arm over her shoulder as she works and tries not to be distracted by the heat of his forearm seeping into her. ‘ _Seeping_ ’ may not have been a strong enough word; ‘ _burning into her_ ’ would have been a better descriptor. She experimentally pushes the torn edges of skin together to decide on the best way to stitch it up. Din barely flinches as she works the needle in and out of his skin. It makes her feel _something_ _strange_ when she thinks about all the times he must have tended to his own injuries over the years. She finds herself being more gentle than she would ever be with her own wound in some weird form of recompense. She finishes tying off the surgical thread and covers his damaged skin with gauze and tapes it down.

“Not too bad, if I do say so myself,” she concludes as she finally sits back and lowers his arm.

“Thank you,” he says kindly. He’s been unusually quiet through the whole thing

“It shouldn’t scar that bad if that’s what you’re worried about.”

He lets out a heavy breath out of his nose. “Not like it matters anyway, with every other scar I have.” 

“What do you mean?” she asks. _Everyone has scars, some are just more visible than others._

“No matter how well you stitched it up, I know it's going to be hideous just like the rest of them.”

She gives him an obvious once over. “I’m looking at you right now and you're not hideous, not by a long shot. You have a couple of scars, sure; but who doesn’t in our line of work?”

She tried to downplay it, because he seemed to be self-conscious, but she can’t deny he's littered with scars. She looks past them as she realizes the gift he’s given her allowing her to see him without his shirt. It’s rare she gets to see more than just his bare hands and she doesn’t want to pass up the opportunity to observe him without crossing a line.

She takes in his skin color, slightly lighter on his torso than on his hands, even though they’re always covered in gloves in the sunlight. She takes in the sprinkling of dark hair across his chest and under his arms. His shoulders are muscular but not obscenely so, and she sees the outline of his abdominal muscles cushioned by the soft skin of his stomach. There’s more of the dark hair she finds herself drawn to underneath his navel and she suddenly feels like she might be staring a bit too hard. _He’s injured Cara, get it together._

“Here, try to stand up,” she suggests, as she reaches out her hand for him to take. She pulls on his uninjured side to get him to a standing position so they’re facing each other.

_._

_What the hell was going on with her hands? Who was controlling these damn things?_

She stood in front of him but couldn’t for the life of her understand what she was seeing. Her hands were on the smooth skin of his chest, ghosting over him in a gentle caress. She ran them from his sternum to smooth over his pectorals, and then up again to run her fingers across his collarbones. _He was so warm._

She came back to herself and looked at his helmet. He was just staring at her.

“I’m sorry, I didn’----" She goes to pull her traitorous hands back, but in a blink, he’s holding her wrists to keep her from retreating. He lets go of her wrists so he can rest his hands flat over the backs of hers.

“Don’t stop………” he said, before adding quietly, “I like it.”

She smiled. Whatever was in the air had returned, but maybe a moment where he was shirtless while she practically groped him was not the best time for this heavy feeling to sink into her belly. It felt dangerous and thrilling and she suddenly felt brave and stupid at the same time. The soft warmth of his chest and the strength of his hands on hers was too much. She had to _do_ something. She reverently, _worshipfully_ , ran her hands over some of the scars she could see. His hands still resting over hers were neither guiding hers nor preventing their journey; they just rested over hers to maintain contact.

“Scars tell a story, Din. There's nothing to be ashamed of. Every scar you have is a time you survived and I’m glad you have each and every one of them. They don’t look bad at all.”

“You don’t have to lie on my account. I know what they look like.” Din doesn’t sound convinced, but he’s appreciative of her words, nonetheless. No one else has really seen him like this.

She huffs at him. “You must think I’m a _special_ brand of hideous, then. I have a lot more scars than you do."

“Come on, Cara, be serious. You know you’re beautiful. No number of scars could ever change that.”

“If you think _your_ battle scars are hideous then so are _mine_. Want to see?” she asked him teasingly, as she drops her hands to her sides.

“See what?” His brain wasn’t sure what she was offering but he was already on board with whatever direction this afternoon might take.

“My scars. You know, the _hideous_ ones.”

“Yes.” The word just fell out of his mouth before he could stop it.

Her hands go to the hem of her shirt and Din’s mind catches up with him.

“Wait, what are you doing?” It’s sweet how almost panicked he sounded just then. Maybe there was a touch of eagerness there too but she couldn’t focus…….The haze filling her brain was making it hard to think of anything other than wanting his hands on her.

“Taking off my shirt, dummy. What does it look like?”

“Uhhh, never mind then. That’s exactly what it looks like,” he says lamely. _He should just stop talking. He sounds like an idiot._

Either Cara is pretending not to notice, or she’s flattered by his inelegant response.

Either way, she peels her shirt up over her head and tosses it on the table. He barely has time for his eyes to zero in on her breasts framed by her sports bra before she turns away from him as he sees her arms moving as she undoes it. He sees the straps fall off her shoulders and follows the fabric as it reveals her bare shoulder blades, before she tosses it aside as well.

She doesn’t make to cover herself at all as she leans over with her hands braced against the edge of the table so her back is on full display for him.

He’s quiet for a minute as her takes her in.

“Cara, a lot of these are blaster shots, what kind of coward shoots someone when their back is turned?”

She laughs at that. “ _Imperial_ cowards that’s who,” she explains. “Some of these I took for other people and some were just being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I know, _hideous_ right?”

“Nothing about you could ever be hideous.” She’s about to make some dumb joke, but she feels his fingers touch her bare back and she freezes. He brushes her hair over her shoulder so it’s no longer impeding his view.

“Go on, tell me what you see,” she says hesitantly.

His mouth is dry. _What does he see?_ He sees the trust she has in him above all else. He sees the soft skin and little whispy hairs on the back of her neck that merge into her dark tresses he loves so much. His eyes follow the curve of her spine, catching on every notch and dimple in her skin. He sees the long, bare expanse of soft skin that’s just begging him to touch it. He sees the muscle just underneath the surface and marvels at the strength there. He runs his fingers along each line of scar tissue before smoothing his palms over her back in a long continuous glide from her shoulders to her hips and he watches as her back arches in appreciation of his touch. He wants to follow the curve of her spine with his lips to see what kind of reaction that would elicit instead.

_She had asked him a question._

“I see a few healed blaster wounds and multiple lacerations probably from a knife. There’s a burn near your hip. Most of them lay flat, they’ve healed well.”

“I have one almost identical to yours, you know. Hold on a second,” she states, as she crosses her arms and adjusts her hands so she’s covering her breasts and turns to face him.

“It’s in the exact same place, but I stitched up it myself. Want to see?”

He moves to her side as she raises her left arm for him to get a better look. She was right, the scar was exactly in the same place as his. The line of scar tissue was wider than he thought it would be, but she said she stitched it herself so that wasn’t surprising. She moved her hand so far away from the scar that her fingers barely concealed her nipple as she lets him see the old battle scar marring the softest part of her.

Din follows it with his eyes and tries to commit it to memory. It curves over the soft skin of her ribs and crawls up the side of her perfect breast before ending at the same place as his.

“Do you think it’s hideous?” she asks, part teasing and part sincere.

“No, of course not. You’re gorgeous,” he says almost a sigh leaving his lips.

“Touch it for me,” she tells him. “Tell me, did it heal okay? What does it feel like?”

“So soft….,” he says, as his fingers savor the wonderful softness of her made bare to his eyes and his hands. The round full curve of her breast gives perfectly under the pressure of his touch over the faded line and he wonders what it would feel like under his palm.

“Perfect…”

She snickers at his response. “The scar tissue, Din. The scar tissue….”

He chuckles at the knowing smile in her voice. “Sorry, I got distracted. It's only raised a little.”

She turns to push her breasts against his still bare chest, so her hands are free to wrap around him.

“You just leave yourself open to dirty jokes, you know that Mando?” She laughs harder and he can feel it move though her chest and into his, as he loosely holds her against him. His hands on her naked lower back is a feeling he won’t forget for a long time and her chest…..now is definitely _not_ the time to think about that. 

“Maybe it’s on purpose,” he suggests. “It’s hard to keep up when you’re distracting me though, “he says.

That must have been the perfect thing to say based on the grin that now graced her face. “Are you saying I distract you?”

“You know you do,” he says fondly. “You’re distracting………and annoying………. and obnoxious…..---” She cuts him off before he can ‘compliment’ her any further.

“You’ve got to watch it with all those sweet words, you’re going to make me blush.”

“You mean like when you took my shirt off….?” He asks, clearly amused.

She makes the most indignant noise he’s ever heard. “You little shit,” she smacks him on his uninjured shoulder. “I did _not_ blush looking at your stupid chest.”

He laughs at her outrage at something so ridiculous. “Oh? You can see how I was confused, then. There was the most delicate pink color on your cheeks that crept down your neck.”

“Maybe next time you can get stabbed in the leg,” she says, as she jabs him in the thigh for that ‘blush’ comment, “and I’ll show you the scars on _my_ legs too.”

“Give me that knife over there then…”

She laughs at him and this feels so familiar it only makes her smile harder. “You know, it _almost_ sounds like you’re trying to get into my pants, Din….” she teases him, with a smile on her face.

“Only _almost_? I guess I’m not doing it right then.”

She leans her body back away from his so she can see his visor clearly. “You’re definitely doing it right, trust me.” That came out more serious than she planned but _fuck it_ , it was the truth. He’s driving her absolutely crazy with his gentle teasing and the respectful way he doesn’t want to push her boundaries, but she can’t imagine things moving more perfectly toward ‘ _whatever this is’_. She’d never met any man like him before, that was for sure. The fact that he saw something in her that mirrored what she saw in him never ceased to amaze her and she would never take it for granted.

“So how do you feel about your new scar?”

He looks down between them where most of her chest is exposed as she leans back.

He assures himself she’s watching him as he looks slowly back up to her face before he asks with a straight face, “what scar?”

It makes her laugh as she reaches over to snag her shirt from the table.

“You seem distracted Din…..you know, the scar I _just_ stitched up?”

“Oh, that one? It’s not so bad,” he says agreeably. “And we kind of have matching ones now so it might become my new favorite. Thanks for putting me back together.”

“No problem. Let’s not make it a habit though okay?” Cara says. She didn’t like the feeling she got seeing his skin torn and bleeding.

“Deal. But just so you know, you can take your shirt off anytime you like,” Din lets her know, just in case. He’s getting tired, but doesn’t want the banter to stop.

“Only if you take yours off too. It’s only fair.” She enjoyed seeing his bare chest more than she probably should have.

“Deal. In the spirit of fairness and all…..”

They still weren’t sure what this _thing_ between them was turning _into_ but it was definitely changing and growing into _something_.

_Something good._

The release she felt finally getting to touch him was enough to make her lightheaded and seeing his hands shaking with anticipation as he touched her made her feel higher than any drug ever could. The little steps they made interspersed with major jumps like today kept her on her toes and she couldn’t wait to see where they went from here. They had time, there was no rush.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading you guys.
> 
> There was absolutely no plot to this but I hope you enjoyed it anyway :)


End file.
